OMETHING E 
GAIN 



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COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



SOMETHING 
ELSE AGAIN 

By 
FRANKLIN P. ADAMS 

Author of 

"By and Large," "In Other Words," 

"Tobogganing on Parnassus," 

"Weights and Measures," 

Etc. 



DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

GARDEN CITY NEW YORK LONDON 

I920 






COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY 

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF 

TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, 

INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN 



APT :20 



CI.A.566772 



,'• 



To MONTAGUE GLASS 



Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/somethingelseagaOOadam 



ACKNOWLEDGMENT 

The author wishes to thank the New York Tribune, 
Life, Harper 7 s Magazine, Collier's Weekly, and The Home 
Sector, for their kind permission to include in this 
volume material which has appeared in their pages. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Present Imperative . 3 

The Doughboy's Horace 5 

From : Horace To : Phyllis 7 

Advising Chloe 8 

To an Aged Cut-up I 9 

II 10 

His Monument 11 

Glycera Rediviva! 12 

On a Wine of Horace's 13 

"What Flavour? " 14 

The Stalling of Q. H. F 15 

On the Flight of Time ^ 16 

The Last Laugh 17 

Again Endorsing the Lady I 19 

II 20 

Propertius's Bid for Immortality ... 21 

A Lament 23 

Bon Voyage — and Vice Versa .... 24 

Fragment 25 

On the Uses of Adversity 26 

After Hearing "Robin Hood" .... 27 

Maud Muller Mutatur 28 

ix 



Contents 

PAGE 

The Carlyles 31 

If Amy Lowell Had Been James Whitcomb 

Riley 35 

If the Advertising Man Had Been Gilbert 37 
If the Advertising Man Had Been Praed, or 

Locker 39 

Georgie Porgie 40 

On First Looking into Bee Palmer's Shoul- 
ders 41 

To a Vers Librist 43 

How Do You Tackle Your Work ? . . . 45 

Recuerdo 48 

On Tradition 51 

Unshackled Thoughts on Chivalry, Romance, 

Adventure, Etc . . 52 

Results Ridiculous 53 

Regarding (1) the U. S. and (2) New York 54 

Broadmindedness 55 

The Jazzy Bard 56 

Lines on and from "Bartlett's Familiar Quo- 
tations" 57 

Thoughts in a Far Country ..... 58 
When You Meet a Man from Your Own 

Home Town 59 

The Shepherd's Resolution 61 

" It Was a Famous Victory" 62 

On Profiteering 63 

Despite 64 

x 



Contents 

PAGE 

The Return of the Soldier 65 

"I Remember, I Remember" .... 66 

The Higher Education 68 

War and Peace 69 

Fifty-Fifty 70 

"So Shines a Good Deed in a Naughty 

World" 71 

Vain Words 72 

On the Importance of Being Earnest . . 73 

It Happens in the B. R. Families ... 74 

Abelard and Heloise 77 

Lines Written on the Sunny Side of Frankfort 

Street 79 

Fifty-Fifty 80 

To Myrtilla 81 

A Psalm of Labouring Life 82 

Ballade of Ancient Acts 84 

To a Prospective Cook 85 

Variation on a Theme 86 

"Such Stuff as Dreams" S^ 

The Ballad of Justifiable Homicide ... 89 

The Ballad of the Murdered Merchant . . 90 

A Gotham Garden of Verses 92 

Lines on Reading Frank J. Wilstach's "A 

Dictionary of Similes" 94 

The Dictaphone Bard 95 

The Comfort of Obscurity 97 

11 



Contents 

PAGE 

Ballade of the Traffickers 98 

To W. Hohenzollern, on Discontinuing The 

Conning Tower * 100 

To W. Hohenzollern, on Resuming The Con- 
ning Tower 103 

Thoughts on the Cosmos 105 

On Environment 106 

The Ballad of the Thoughtless Waiter . . 107 

Rus Vs. Urbs . . 109 

"I'm Out of the Army Now" no 

"Oh Man!" 112 

An Ode in Time of Inauguration . , . 113 

What the Copy Desk Might Have Done . 124 

Song of Synthetic Virility ..... 133 



Xll 



SOMETHING ELSE AGAIN 



Present Imperative 

Horace: Book X, Ode 11 

(f Tu ne quaesieris — scire nefas — quern mihi; 
quern tibi " 

AD LEUCONOEN 

NAY, query not, Leuconoe, the finish of 
the fable; 
Eliminate the worry as to what the years may 

hoard ! 
You only waste your time upon the Babylonian 

Table— 
(Slang for the Ouija board). 

And as to whether Jupiter, the final, unsur- 
passed one, 

May add a lot of winters to our portion here 
below, 

Or this impinging season is to be our very 
last one — 

Really, I'd hate to know. 



Apply yourself to wisdom! Sweep the floor 

and wash the dishes, 
Nor dream about the things you'll do in 1928 ! 
My counsel is to cease to sit and yearn about 

your wishes, 
Cursing the throws of Fate. 

3 



Something Else Again 

My ! how I have been chattering on matters 

sad and pleasant ! 
(Endure with me a moment while I polish off 

a rhyme). 
If I were you, I think, I'd bother only with 

the present — 
Now is the only time. 



The Doughboy's Horace 

Horace: Book III, Ode 9 

"Donee eram gratus tibi " 

HORACE, PVT. TH INFANTRY, A. E. F., WRITES 

WHILE I was fussing you at home 
You put the notion in my dome 
That I was the Molasses Kid. 
I batted strong. I'll say I did. 

LYDIA, ANYBURG, U. S. A., WRITES: 

While you were fussing me alone 
To other boys my heart was stone. 
When I was all that you could see 
No girl had anything on me. 

HORACE : 

Well, say, I'm having some romance 
With one Babette, of Northern France. 
If that girl gave me the command 
I'd dance a jig in No Man's Land. 

lydia : 

I, too, have got a young affair 
With Charley — say, that boy is there! 
I'd just as soon go out and die 
If I thought it'd please that guy. 

5 



Something Else Again 



HORACE : 

Suppose I can this foreign wren 
And start things up with you again? 
Suppose I promise to be good? 
I'd love you, Lyd. I'll say I would. 

lydia : 

Though Charley's good and handsome — oh, 

boy! 
And you're a stormy, fickle doughboy, 
Go give the Hun his final whack, 
And I'll marry you when you come back. 



6 



From: Horace 
To: Phyllis 
Subject: Invitation 

Book XV, Ode 11 

( Est mihi nonum superantis annum- 



PHYLLIS, I've a jar of wine, 
(Alban, B. C. 49), 
Parsley wreaths, and, for your tresses, 
Ivy that your beauty blesses. 

Shines my house with silverware; 
Frondage decks the altar stair — 
Sacred vervain, a device 
For a lambkin's sacrifice. 

Up and down the household stairs 
What a festival prepares ! 
Everybody's superintending — 
See the sooty smoke ascending! 

What, you ask me, is the date 
Of the day we celebrate? 
13th April, month of Venus — 
Birthday of my boss, Maecenas. 

Let me, Phyllis, say a word 
Touching Telephus, a bird 
Ranking far too high above you; 
(And the loafer doesn't love you). 
7 



Something Else Again 

Lessons, Phyllie, may be learned 
From Phaeton — how he was burned! 
And recall Bellerophon was 
One equestrian who thrown was. 

Phyllis, of my loves the/ last, 
My philandering days are past. 
Sing you, in your clear contralto, 
Songs I write for the rialto. 



Advising Chloe 

Horace: Boole X, Ode 23 

"Vitas hinnuleo me similis, Chloe >y 

WHY shun me, my Chloe? Nor pistol 
nor bowie 
Is mine with intention to kill. 
And yet like a llama you run to your mamma ; 
You tremble as though you were ill. 

No lion to rend you, no tiger to end you, 

I'm tame as a bird in a cage. 
That counsel maternal can run for The Jour- 
nal — 
You get me, I guess. . . . You're of age. 

8 



To An Aged Cut-up 

Horace; Book XXX, Ode 15 



"Uxor pauperis Ibyci, 

Tandem nequitice fige modum tuce " 

IN CHLORIN 

DEAR Mrs. Ibycus, accept a little sound 
advice, 
Your manners and your speech are over- 
bold; 
To chase around the sporty way you do is far 
from nice; 
Believe me, darling, you are growing old. 



Now Pholoe may fool around (she dances like 
a doe!) 
A debutante has got to think of men; 
But you were twenty-seven over thirty years 
ago— 
You ought to be asleep at half-past ten. 

O Chloris, cut the ragging and the roses and 
the rum — 
Delete the drink, or better, chop the booze ! 
Go buy a skein of yarn and make the knitting 
needles hum, 
And imitate the art of Sister Suse. 

9 



Something Else Again 



ii 



CHLORIS, lay off the flapper stuff; 
What's fit for Pholoe, a fluff, 
Is not for Ibycus's wife — 
A woman at your time of life ! 



Ignore, old dame, such pleasures as 
The shimmy and "the Bacchus Jazz"; 
Your presence with the maidens jars— 
You are the cloud that dims the stars. 



Your daughter Pholoe may stay 
Out nights upon the Appian Way; 
Her love for Nothus, as you know, 
Makes her as playful as a doe. 

No jazz for you, no jars of wine, 
No rose that blooms incarnadine. 
For one thing only are you fit: 
Buy some Lucerian wool — and knit! 



10 



His Monument 

Horace: Book XXX, Ode 30 

"Exegi monumentum aere perennius- 



THE monument that I have built is dur- 
able as brass, 
And loftier than the Pyramids which mock 

the years that pass. 
Nor blizzard can destroy it, nor furious rain 

corrode — 
Remember, I'm the bard that built the first 
Horatian ode. 

I shall not altogether die; a part of me's im- 
mortal. 

A part of me shall never pass the mortuary 
portal ; 

And when I die my fame shall stand the nitric 
test of time — 

The fame of me of lowly birth, who built the 
lofty rhyme ! 

Ay, fame shall be my portion when no trace 

there is of me, 
For I first made yEolian songs the songs of 

Italy. 
Accept I pray, Melpomene, my modest meed 

of praise, 
And crown my thinning, graying locks with 

wreaths of Delphic bays ! 
ii 



Glycera Rediviva! 

Horace: Book Z, Ode 19 

"Mater sceva Cupidinum" 

VENUS, the cruel mother of 
The Cupids (symbolising Love), 
Bids me to muse upon and sigh 
For things to which I've said "Good-bye I" 

Believe me or believe me not, 
I give this Glycera girl a lot: 
Pure Parian marble are her arms — 
And she has eighty other charms. 

Venus has left her Cyprus home 
And will not let me pull a pome 
About the Parthians, fierce and rough, 
The Scythian war, and all that stuff. 

Set up, O slaves, a verdant shrine! 
Uncork a quart of last year's wine ! 
Place incense here, and here verbenas, 
And watch me while I jolly Venus! 



12 



On a Wine of Horace's 

WHAT time I read your mighty line, 
O Mr. Q. Horatius Flaccus, 
In praise of many an ancient wine — 

You twanged a wicked lyre to Bacchus! 
I wondered, like a Yankee hick, 
If that old stuff contained a kick. 



So when upon a Paris card 

I glimpsed Falernian, I said: "Waiter, 
I'll emulate that ancient bard, 

And pass upon his merits later." 
Professor Mendell, quelque sport, 
Suggested that we split a quart. 

Flaccus, ere I ceased to drink 
Three glasses and a pair of highballs, 

1 could not talk; I could not think; 
For I was pickled to the eyeballs. 

If you sopped up Falernian wine 
How did you ever write a line? 



13 



"What Flavour?" 

Horace: Book ZH y Ode 13 

O fons Bandusice, splendidior vitro- 



w 



ORTHY of flowers and syrups sweet, 
O fountain of Bandusian onyx, 



To-morrow shall a goatling's bleat 
Mix with the sizz of thy carbonics. 



A kid whose budding horns portend 
A life of love and war — but vainly ! 

For thee his sanguine life shall end — 
He'll spill his blood, to put it plainly. 

And never shalt thou feel the heat 
That blazes in the days of Sirius, 

But men shall quaff thy soda sweet, 
And girls imbibe thy drinks delirious. 

Fountain whose dulcet cool I sing, 
Be thou immortal by this Ode (a 

Not wholly meretricious thing), 
Bandusian fount of ice-cream soda! 



14 



The Stalling of Q. H. F. 

Horace: Epode 14 

"Mollis inertia cur t ant am diffuderit imis" 

MAECENAS, you fret me, you worry me 
Demanding I turn out a rhyme; 
Insisting on reasons, you hurry me; 

You want my iambics on time. 
You say my ambition's diminishing; 
You ask why my poem's not done. 
The god it is keeps me from finishing 
The stuff I've begun. 



Be not so persistent, so clamorous. 

Anacreon burned with a flame 
Candescently, crescently amorous. 

You rascal, you're doing the same! 
Was no fairer the flame that burned Ilium, 

Cheer up, you're a fortunate scamp, 
. . . Consider avuncular William 
And Phryne, the vamp. 



IS 



On the Flight of Time 

Horace: Book X, Ode 2 

"Tu ne quasieris, scire nefas, quern mihi^ 
quern tibi" 

AD LEUCONOEN 

LOOK not, Leuconoe, into the future; 
Seek not to find what the Answer may 
be; 
Let no Chaldean clairvoyant compute your 
Time of existence. ... It irritates me ! 

Better to bear what may happen soever 
Patiently, playing it through like a sport, 

Whether the end of your breathing is Never, 
Or, as is likely, your time will be short. 

This is the angle, the true situation; 

Get me, I pray, for I'm putting you hep : 
While I've been fooling with versification 

Time has been flying. . . . Both gates ! 
Watch your step ! 



16 



The Last Laugh 

Horace: Epcde !t5 

Nox erat et cclo fulgebat Lima sereno- 



HOW sweet the moonlight sleeps/' I 
quoted, 
"Upon this bank !" that starry night — 
The night you vowed you'd be devoted — 
I'll tell the world you held me tight. 

The night you said until Orion 

Should cease to whip the wintry sea, 

Until the lamb should love the lion, 
You would, you swore, be all for me. 

Some day, Nesera, you'll be sorry. 

No mollycoddle swain am I. 
I shall not sit and pine, by gorry ! 

Because you're with some other guy! 

No, I shall turn my predilection 

Upon some truer, fairer Jane; 
And all your prayer and genuflexion 

For my return shall be in vain. 

And as for you, who choose to sneer, O, 
Though deals in lands and stocks you swing, 

Though handsome as a movie hero, 
Though wise you are — and everything; 
17 



Something Else Again 

Yet, when the loss of her you're mourning, 
How I shall laugh at all your woe ! 

How I'll remind you of this warning, 
And laugh, "Ha! ha! I told you so!" 



18 



Again Endorsing the Lady- 
Bo o& 33, Elegry 2 

'Liber eram et vacuo tneditabar vivere 
lecto " 



I WAS free. I thought that I had entered 
Love's Antarctic Zone. 
"A truce to sentiment/' I said. "My nights 

shall be my own." 
But Love has double-crossed me. How can 

Beauty be so fair? 
The grace of her, the face of her — and oh, 
her yellow hair ! 



And oh, the wondrous walk of her ! So doth 

a goddess glide. 
Jove's sister — ay, or Pallas — hath no statelier 

a stride. 
Fair as Ischomache herself, the Lapithanian 

maid; 
Or Brimo when at Mercury's side her virgin 

form she laid. 

Surrender now, ye goddesses whom erst the 

shepherd spied! 
Upon the heights of Ida lay your vestitures 

aside ! 

19 



Something Else Again 

And though she reach the countless years of 

the Cumaean Sibyl, 
May never, never Age at those delightful 

features nibble ! 



ii 



I THOUGHT that I was wholly free, 
That I had Love upon the shelf; 
"Hereafter," I declared in glee, 

"I'll have my evenings to myself." 
How can such mortal beauty live? 
(Ah, Jove, thine errings I forgive!) 



Her tresses pale the sunlight's gold; 

Her hands are featly formed, and taper; 
Her — well, the rest ought not be told 

In any modest family paper. 
Fair as Ischomache, and bright 
As Brimo. Quczque queen is right. 



O goddesses of long ago, 

A shepherd called ye sweet and slender, 
He saw ye, so he ought to know; 

But sooth, to her ye must surrender. 
O may a million years not trace 
A single line upon that face! 

20 



Propertius's Bid for Immortality 

Book IUj Ode 3 

"Carminis interea nostri redcemus in 
orb em ■' 

LET us return, then, for a time, 
To our accustomed round of rhyme; 
And let my songs' familiar art 
Not fail to move my lady's heart. 

They say that Orpheus with his lute 
Had power to tame the wildest brute; 
That "Variations on a Theme" 
Of his would stay the swiftest stream. 

They say that by the minstrel's song 
Cithaeron's rocks were moved along 
To Thebes, where, as you may recall, 
They formed themselves to frame a wall. 

And Galatea, lovely maid, 
Beneath wild Etna's fastness stayed 
Her horses, dripping with the mere, 
Those Polypheman songs to hear. 

What marvel, then, since Bacchus and 
Apollo grasp me by the hand, 
That all the maidens you have heard 
Should hang upon my slightest word? 

21 



Something Else Again 

Tsenerian columns in my home 
Are not; nor any golden dome; 
No parks have I, nor Marcian spring, 
Nor orchards — nay, nor anything. 



The Muses, though, are friends of mine; 
Some readers love my lyric line; 
And never is Calliope 
Awearied by my poetry. 

O happy she whose meed of praise 
Hath fallen upon my sheaf of lays ! 
And every song of mine is sent 
To be thy beauty's monument. 

The Pyramids that point the sky, 
The House of Jove that soars so high, 
Mausolus' tomb — they are not free 
From Death his final penalty. 

For fire or rain shall steal away 
The crumbling glory of their day; 
But fame for wit can never die, 
And gosh ! I was a gay old guy ! 



22 



A Lament 

Propertius: Book XZ, Elegy 8 

'Eripitur nobis iam pridem cava puclla- 



WHILE she I loved is being torn 
From arms that held her many years, 
Dost thou regard me, friend, with scorn, 
Or seek to check my tears? 

Bitter the hatred for a jilt, 
And hot the hates of Eros are; 

My hatred, slay me an thou wilt, 
For thee'd be gentler far. 

Can I endure that she recline 
Upon another's arm? Shall they 

No longer call that lady "mine" 
Who "mine" was yesterday? 

For Love is fleeting as the hours. 

The town of Thebes is draped with moss, 
And Ilium's well-known topless towers 

Are now a total loss. 



Fell Thebes and Troy; and in the grave 
Have fallen lords of high degree. 

What songs I sang! What gifts I gave! 
. . . She never fell for me. 
23 



Bon Voyage — and Vice Versa 

Fropertius: Elegy VUL, Fart 1 

"Tune igitur demens, nee te mea citra 
moratur?" 

O CYNTHIA, hast thou lost thy mind? 
Have I no claim on thine affection? 
Dost love the chill Illyrian wind 

With something passing predilection? 
And is thy friend — whoe'er he be — 
The kind to take the place of me? 



Ah, canst thou bear the surging deep? 

Canst thou endure the hard ship's-mattress? 
For scant will be thy hours of sleep 

From Staten Island to Cape Hatt'ras; 
And won't thy fairy feet be froze 
With treading on the foreign snows? 



I hope that doubly blows the gale, 
With billows twice as high as ever, 

So that the captain, fain to sail, 
May not achieve his mad endeavour! 

The winds, when that they cease to roar, 

Shall find me wailing on the shore. 

24 



Fragment 

Yet merit thou my love or wrath, 
O False, I pray that Galatea 

May smile upon thy watery path ! 
A pleasant trip, — that's the idea. 

Light of my life, there never shall 

For me be any other gal. 



And sailors, as they hasten past, 
Will always have to hear my query: 

"Where have you seen my Cynthia last? 
Has anybody seen my dearie ?" 

I'll shout: "In Maiden or Marquette 

Where'er she be, I'll have her yet!" 



Fragment 



'Militis in galea nidum fcccrc columba." 

PETRONIUS 

WITHIN the soldier's helmet see 
The nesting dove; 
Venus and Mars, it seems to me, 
In love. 

25 



On the Uses of Adversity 

"Nam nihil est, quod non mortalibus afferat 

USUm" — PETRONIUS 

NOTHING there is that mortal man may 
utterly despise; 
What in our wealth we treasured, in our 
poverty we prize. 



The gold upon a sinking ship has often 

wrecked the boat, 
While on a simple oar a shipwrecked man 

may keep afloat. 

The burglar seeks the plutocrat, attracted by 
his dress — 

The poor man finds his poverty the true pre- 
paredness. 



26 



After Hearing "Robin Hood" 

THE songs of Sherwood Forest 
Are lilac-sweet and clear; 
The virile rhymes of merrier times 
Sound fair upon mine ear. 



Sweet is their sylvan cadence 
And sweet their simple art. 

The balladry of the greenwood tree 
Stirs memories in my heart. 

O braver days and elder 
With mickle valour dight, 

How ye bring back the time, alack ! 
When Harry Smith could write ! 



27 



Maud Muller Mutatur 



In 1909 toilet goods were In 1919 an assortment of 

not considered a serious perfumes that would rival 

matter and no special de- any city department store 

partment of the catalogs is shown, along with six 

was devoted to it. A few pages of other toilet ar- 

perfumes and creams were tides, including rouge and 

scattered here and there eyebrow pencils, 
among bargain goods. 

— From "How the Farmer Has Changed in a Decade: 
Toilet Goods/* in Farm and Fireside's advertise- 
ment. 



M 



AUD MULLER, on a summer's day, 
Powdered her nose with Bon Sachet. 



Beneath her lingerie hat appeared 
Eyebrows and cheeks that were well 
veneered. 



Singing she rocked on the front piazz, 
To the tune of "The Land of the Sky Blue 
Jazz." 

But the song expired on the summer air, 
And she said "This won't get me anywhere/' 

The judge in his car looked up at her 

And signalled "Stop I" to his brave chauffeur. 

He smiled a smile that is known as broad, 
And he said to Miss Muller, "Hello, how's 
Maud?" 

28 



Maud Midler Mutatur 

"What sultry weather this is? Gee whiz!" 
Said Maud. Said the judge, 'Til say it is." 



"Your coat is heavy. Why don't you shed 

it? 
Have a drink?" said Maud. Said the judge, 

"You said it." 



And Maud, with the joy of bucolic youth, 
Blended some gin and some French vermouth. 

Maud Muller sighed, as she poured the gin, 
"Fve got something on Whittier's heroine." 



"Thanks," said the judge, "a peppier brew 
From a fairer hand was never knew." 



And when the judge had had number 7, 
Maud seemed an angel direct from Heaven. 

And the judge declared, "You're a lovely girl, 
An' I'm for you, Maudie, Fll tell the worl'." 

And the judge said, "Marry me, Maudie 

dearie ?" 
And Maud said yes to the well known query. 

29 



Something Else Again 

And she often thinks, in her rustic way, 
As she powders her nose with Bon Sachet, 



"1 never'n the world would 'a got that guy, 
If Fd waited till after the First o' July." 

And of all glad words of prose or rhyme, 
The gladdest are, "Act while there yet is 
time." 



30 



The Carlylcs 



[I was talking with a newspaper man the other day 
who seemed to think that the fact that Mrs. Carlyle 
threw a teacup at Mr. Carlyle should be given to the 
public merely as a fact. 

But a fact presented to people without the proper — 
or even, if necessary, without the improper — human 
being to go with it does not mean anything and does 
not really become alive or caper about in people's minds. 

But what I want and what I believe most people want 
when a fact is being presented is one or two touches 
that will make natural and human questions rise in and 
play about like this: 

"Did a servant see Mrs. Carlyle throw the teacup? 
Was the servant an ^ English servant with an English 
imagination or an Irish servant with an Irish imagina- 
tion? What would the fact have been like if Mr. 
Browning had been listening at the keyhole? Or Oscar 
Wilde, or Punch, or the Missionary Herald, or The New 
York Sun, or the Christian Science Monitor?" — Gerald 
Stanley Lee in the Satevepost.] 



BY OUR OWN ROBERT BROWNING 

AS a poet heart- and fancy-free — whole, 
I listened at the Carlyles' keyhole; 
And I saw, I, Robert Browning, saw, 
Tom hurl a teacup at Jane's jaw. 
She silent sat, nor tried to speak up 
When came the wallop with the teacup — 
A cup not filled with Beaune or Clicquot, 
But one that brimmed with Orange Pekoe. 
"Jane Welsh Carlyle," said Thomas, bold, 
"The tea you brewed for m' breakfast's cold ! 
I'm feeling low i' my mind; a thing 
You know b' this time. Have at you!" . . . 

Bing! 
And hurled, threw he at her the teacup; 
And I wrote it, deeming it unique, up. 
* * * * 

31 



Something Else Again 



BY OUR OWN OSCAR WILDE 

Lady Leffingwell (coldly). — A full tea- 
cup ! What a waste ! So many good women 
and so little good tea. 

[Exit Lady Lejfmgwett] 



FROM OUR OWN" "FUN OH " 



A Manchester autograph collector, we are 
informed, has just o tiered £50 for the signa- 
ture of Tea Carlvle. 



FROM OUR OWN "MISSIONARY HERAU)" 



From what clouds cannot sunshine be dis- 
tilled ! When, in a ri: of godless rage, Mr. 
Carlvle threw a teacup at the goo.; woman he 
had vowed at the altar to love, honour, and 
obey, she smiled and the thought of China 
entered her he. 

Yesterday Mrs. Carlvle enrolled as a mis- 
sionary, and will sail for the benighted land 
of the heathen to-morrow. 



33 



The Carlyles 



FROM OUR OWN "NEW YORK SUN*' 

Fortunate is Mrs. Jane Welsh Carlyle 
to have escaped with her life, though if she 
had not, no American worthy of the tradi- 
tions of Washington could simulate acute 
sorrow. Mr. Carlyle, wearied of the dila- 
tory methods of the Bakerian War Depart- 
ment, properly took the law into his own 
strong hands. 

The argument that resulted in the teacup's 
leaving Mr. Carlyle's hands w'as common in 
most households. It transpires that Mrs. 
Carlyle, with a Bolshevistic tendency that 
makes patriots wonder what the Department 
of Justice — to borrow a phrase from a news- 
paper cartoonist — thinks about, had been 
championing the British- Wilson League of 
Nations, that league which will make ironi- 
cally true our "E Pluribus Unum" — one of 
many. Repeated efforts by Mr. Carlyle, in 
appeals to the Department of Justice, the 
Military Intelligence Division, and the City 
Government, were of no avail. And so Mr. 
Carlyle, like the red-blooded American he 
is, did what the authorities should have saved 
him the embarrassing trouble of doing. 

* * * * 

33 



Something Else Again 



FROM OUR OWN "CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR" 



It is reported that Mr. Thomas Carlyle has 
thrown a teacup at Mrs. Carlyle, and much 
exaggerated and acrid comment has been 
made on this incident. 

If it had been a whiskey glass, or a cock- 
tail glass, the results might have been fatal. 
In Oregon, which went dry in 191 6, the num- 
ber of women hit by crockery has decreased 
4.2 per cent in three years. Of 1,844 women 
in Oregon hit by crockery in 1915, 1,802 were 
hit by glasses containing, or destined to con- 
tain, alcoholic stimulants. More than 94 per 
cent of these accidents resulted fatally. The 
remaining 22 women, hit by tea or coffee 
cups, are now happy, useful members of 
society. 



34 



If Amy Lowell Had Been James 
Whitcomb Riley 

A DECADE 

WHEN you came you were like red wine 
and honey, 
And the taste of you burnt my mouth with 

its sweetness. 
Now you are like morning bread — 
Smooth and pleasant, 
I hardly taste you at all, for I know your 

savour, 
But I am completely nourished. 

— Amy Lowell, in The Chimara* 



When I wuz courtin' Annie, she wuz honey 

an' red wine, 
She made me feel all jumpy, did that oY 

sweetheart o' mine; 
W^unst w'en I went to Craw fords ville, on 

one o' them there trips, 
I kissed her — an' the burnin' taste wuz 

sizzlin' on my lips. 
An' now I've married Annie, an' I see her 

all the time, 
I do not feel the daily need o' busting into 

rhyme. 
An* now the wine-y taste is gone, fer Annie's 

always there, 

35 



Something Else Again 

An* I take her fer granted now, the same ez 

sun an' air. 
But though the honey taste wuz sweet, an' 

though the wine wuz strong, 
Yet ef I lost the sun an* air, I couldn't git 

along. 



36 



If the Advertising Man Had 
Been Gilbert 

NEVER mind that slippery wet street — 
The tire with a thousand claws will 
hold you. 

Stop as quickly as you will — 

Those thousand claws grip the road like a 
vise. 

Turn as sharply as you will — 

Those thousand claws take a steel-prong grip 
on the road to prevent a side skid. 

You're safe — safer than anything else will 
make you — 

Safe as you would be on a perfectly dry 
street. 

And those thousand claws are mileage insur- 
ance, too. 

— From the Lancaster Tire and Rubber Com- 
pany's advertisement in the Satevepost. 



Never mind it if you find it wet upon the 
street and slippery; 
Never bother if the street is full of ooze; 
Do not fret that you'll upset, that you will 
spoil your summer frippery, 
You may turn about as sharply as you 
choose. 
For those myriad claws will grip the road and 
keep the car from skidding, 
37 



Something Else Again 

And your steering gear will hold it fast 
and true; 
Every atom of the car will be responsive to 
your bidding, 
AND those thousand claws are mileage in- 
surance, too — 

Oh, indubitably, 
Those thousand claws are mileage insur- 
ance, too. 



38 



If the Advertising Man Had 
Been Praed, or Locker 

C'EST DISTINGUE," says Madame La 
Mode, 
Tis a fabric of subtle distinction. 
For street wear it is superb. 

The chic of the Rue de la Paix — 
The style of Fifth Avenue — 

The character of Regent Street — 
All are expressed in this new fabric creation. 

Leather-like but feather-light — 
It drapes and folds and distends to perfection. 

And it may be had in dull or glazed, 
Plain or grained, basket weave or moired sur- 
faces ! 
— Advertisement of Pontine, in Vanity Fair. 



"Cest distingue," says Madame La Mode. 

Subtly distinctive as a fabric fair; 
Nor Keats nor Shelley in his loftiest ode 

Could thrum the line to tell how it will 
wear. 



The flair, the chic that is Rue de la Paix, 
The style that is Fifth Avenue, New York, 

The character of Regent Street in May — 
As leather strong, yet light as any cork. 
39 



Something Else Again 

All these for her in this fair fabric clad. 

(Light of my life, O thou my Genevieve!) 
In surface dull or glazed it may be had — 

In plain or grained, moired or basket 
weave. 



Georgie Porgie 

By Mother Goose and Our Own Sara 
Teasdale 

BENNIE'S kisses left me cold, 
Eddie's made me yearn to die, 
Jimmie's made me laugh aloud,— 
But Georgie's made me cry. 

Bennie sees me every night, 

Eddie sees me every day, 
Jimmie sees me all the time, — 

But Georgie stays away. 



40 



On First Looking into Bee 
Palmer's Shoulders 

WITH BOWS TO KEATS AND KEITH'S 

["The World's Most Famous Shoulders"] 

"Then felt I like some watcher of the skies 
When a new planet swims into his ken, 

Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes 
He stared at the Pacific — and all his men 

Looked at each other with a wild surmise — 
Silent upon a peak in Darien." 



"BEE" PALMER has taken the raw, human— all too 
human — stuff of the underworld, with its sighs of sad- 
ness and regret, its mad merriment, its swift blaze of 
passion, its turbulent dances, its outlaw music, its songs 
of the social bandit, and made a new art product of the 
theatre. She is to the sources of jazz and the blues 
what Francois Villon was to the wild life of Paris. 
Both have found exquisite blossoms of art in the sector 
of life most removed from the concert room and the 
boudoir, and their harvest has the vigour, the resolute 
life, the stimulating quality, the indelible impress of 
daredevil, care-free, do-as-you-please lives of the pic- 
turesque men and women who defy convention. — From 
Keitlrs Press Agent. 



MUCH have I travelled in the realms of 
jazz, 
And many goodly arms and shoulders seen 
Quiver and quake — if you know what I mean ; 
Fve seen a lot, as everybody has. 
Some plaudits got, while others got the razz. 
But when I saw Bee Palmer, shimmy queen, 
I shook — in sympathy — my troubled bean, 
And said, "This is the utter razmataz." 

4i 



Something Else Again 

Then felt I like some patient with a pain 
When a new surgeon swims into his ken, 
Or like stout Brodie, when, with reeling 

brain, 
He jumped into the river. There and then 
I subwayed up and took the morning train 
To Norwalk, Naugatuck, and Darien. 



4* 



To a Vers Librist 

OH bard," I said, "your verse is free; 
The shackles that encumber me, 
The fetters that are my obsession, 
Are never gyves to your expression. 



'The fear of falsities in rhyme, 
In metre, quantity, or time, 
Is never yours; you sing along 
Your unpremeditated song." 



"Correct," the young vers librist said. 
"Whatever pops into my head 
I write, and have but one small fetter 
I start each line with a capital letter. 



"But rhyme and metre — Ishkebibble ! — 
Are actually neglig/Me. 
I go ahead, like all my school, 
Without a single silly rule." 



Of rhyme I am so reverential 
He made me feel inconsequential. 
I shed some strongly saline tears 
For bards I loved in younger years. 

43 



Something Else Again 

"If Keats had fallen for your fluff," 
I said, "he might have done good stuff. 
If Burns had thrown his rhymes away, 
His songs might still be sung to-day." 



O bards of rhyme and metre free, 

My gratitude goes out to ye 

For all your deathless lines — ahem ! 

Let's see, now. . . . What is one of them? 



44 



How Do You Tackle Your Work? 

HOW do you tackle your work each day? 
Are you scared of the job you find? 
Do you grapple the task that comes your way 

With a confident, easy mind? 
Do you stand right up to the work ahead 

Or fearfully pause to view it? 
Do you start to toil with a sense of dread? 
Or feel that you're going to do it? 



You can do as much as you think you can, 

But you'll never accomplish more; 
If you're afraid of yourself, young man, 

There's little for you in store. 
For failure comes from the inside first, 

It's there if we only knew it, 
And you can win, though you face the worst, 

If you feel that you're going to do it. 



Success! It's found in the soul of you, 

And not in the realm of luck ! 
The world will furnish the work to do, 

But you must provide the pluck. 
You can do whatever you think you can, 

It's all in the way you view it. 
It's all in the start that you make, young 
man: 

You must feel that you're going to do it. 
45 



Something Else Again 

How do you tackle your work each day? 

With confidence clear, or dread? 
What to yourself do you stop and say 

When a new task lies ahead? 
What is the thought that is in your mind? 

Is fear ever running through it? 
If so, just tackle the next you find 

By thinking you're going to do it. 
—From "A Heap o' Livin'," by Edgar A, 

Guest. 



I tackle my terrible job each day 

With a fear that is well defined; 
And I grapple the task that comes my way 

With no confidence in my mind. 
I try to evade the work ahead, 

As I fearfully pause to view it, 
And I start to toil with a sense of dread, 

And doubt that I'm going to do it. 



I can't do as much as I think I can, 

And I never accomplish more. 
I am scared to death of myself, old man, 

As I may have observed before. 
I've read the proverbs of Charley Schwab, 

Carnegie, and Marvin Hughitt; 
But whenever I tackle a difficult job, 

O gosh ! how I hate to do it ! 

4 6 



How Do You Tackle Your Work? 

I try to believe in my vaunted power 

With that confident kind of bluff, 
But somebody tells me The Conning Tower 

Is nothing but awful stuff. 
And I take up my impotent pen that night, 

And idly and sadly chew it, 
As I try to write something merry and bright, 

And I know that I shall not do it. 



And that's how I tackle my work each day — 

With terror and fear and dread — 
And all I can see is a long array 

Of empty columns ahead. 
And those are the thoughts that are in my 
mind, 

And that's about all there's to it. 
As long as it's work, of whatever kind, 

I'm certain I cannot do it. 



47 



Recuerdo 

WE were very tired, we were very 
merry — 
We had gone back and forth all night on the 

ferry. 
It was bare and bright, and smelled like a 

stable — 
But we looked into a fire, we leaned across a 

table, 
We lay on the hill-top underneath the moon; 
And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn 

came soon. 



We were very tired, we were very merry— 
We had gone back and forth all night on the 

ferry; 
And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear, 
From a dozen of each we had bought some- 
where; 
And the sky went wan, and the wind came 

cold, 
And the sun rose dripping, a bucketful of 
gold. 



We were very tired, we were very merry, 
We had gone back and forth all night on the 

ferry. 
We hailed, "Good morrow, mother !" to a 

shawl-covered head, 

4 8 



Recuerdo 

And bought a morning- paper, which neither 
of us read; 

And she wept, "God bless you !" for the apples 
and pears, 

And we gave her all our money but our sub- 
way fares. 
— Edna St. Vincent Millay, in Poetry. 



I was very sad, I was very solemn — 
I had worked all day grinding out a column. 
I came back from dinner at half-past seven, 
And I couldn't think of anything till quarter 

to eleven; 
And then I read "Recuerdo," by Miss Millay, 
And I said, "I'll bet a nickel I can write that 

way." 



I was very sad, I was very solemn — 

I had worked all day whittling out a column. 

I said, "I'll bet a nickel I can chirp such a 

chant," 
And Mr. Geoffrey Parsons said, "I'll bet you 

can't." 
I bit a chunk of chocolate and found it sweet, 
And I listened to the trucking on Frankfort 

Street. 

49 



Something Else Again 

I was very sad, I was very solemn — 
I had worked all day fooling with a column. 
I got as far as this and took my verses in 
To Mr. Geoffrey Parsons, who said, "Kid, you 

win." 
And — not that I imagine that any one'll care — 
I blew that jitney on a subway fare. 



50 



On Tradition 

LINES PROVOKED BY HEARING A YOUNG MAN 
WHISTLING 

NO carmine radical in Art, 
I worship at the shrine of Form; 
Yet open are my mind and heart 

To each departure from the norm. 
When Post-Impressionism emerged, 

I hesitated but a minute 
Before I saw, though it diverged, 

That there was something healthy in it. 

And eke when Music, heavenly maid, 

Undid the chains that chafed her feet, 
I grew to like discordant shade — 

Unharmony I thought was sweet. 
When verse divorced herself from sound, 

I wept at first. Now I say: "Oh, well, 
I see some sense in Ezra Pound, 

And nearly some in Amy Lowell." 

Yet, though I storm at every change, 

And each mutation makes me wince, 
I am not shut to all things strange — 

Fm rather easy to convince. 
But hereunto I set my seal, 

My nerves awry, askew, abristling: 
Fit never change the way I feel 

Upon the question of Free Whistling, 
51 



Unshackled Thoughts on Chivalry, 
Romance, Adventure, Etc. 

YESTERDAY afternoon, while I was 
walking on Worth Street, 

A gust of wind blew my hat off. 

I swore, petulantly, but somewhat noisily. 

A young woman had been near, walking be- 
hind me; 

She must have heard me, I thought. 

And I was ashamed, and embarrassedly sorry. 

So I said to her: "If you heard me, I beg 
your pardon." 

But she gave me a frightened look 

And ran across the street, 

Seeking a policeman. 

So I thought, Why waste five hours trying 
to versify the incident? 

Vers libre would serve her right. 



52 



Results Ridiculous 



("Humourists have amused themselves by translating 
famous sonnets into free verse. A result no less ridic- 
ulous would have been obtained if somebody had re- 
written a passage from 'Paradise Lost* as a rondeau." 
— George Soule in the New Republic.) 



"paradise lost" 



SING, Heavenly Muse, in lines that flow 
More smoothly than the wandering Po, 
Of man's descending from the height 
Of Heaven itself, the blue, the bright, 
To Hell's unutterable throe. 



Of sin original and the woe 
That fell upon us here below 

From man's pomonic primal bite — 
Sing, Heavenly Muse ! 



Of summer sun, of winter snow, 

Of future days, of long ago, 

Of morning and "the shades of night/ 
Of woman, "my ever new delight," 

Go to it, Muse, and put us joe — 

Sing, Heavenly Muse ! 

***** 

53 



Something Else Again 

"the rime of the ancient mariner" 

THE wedding guest sat on a stone, 
He could not choose but hear 
The mariner. They were there alone. 
The wedding guest sat on a stone. 
'Til read you something of my own/' 

Declared that mariner. 
The wedding guest sat on a stone — 
He could not choose but hear. 



Regarding (i) the U. S. and (2) 
New York 

BEFORE I was a travelled bird, 
I scoffed, in my provincial way, 
At other lands; I deemed absurd 
All nations but these U. S. A. 

And — although Middle-Western born— 

Before I was a travelled guy, 
I laughed at, with unhidden scorn, 

All cities but New York, N. Y. 

But now I've been about a bit — 
How travel broadens ! How it does ! 

And I have found out this, to wit: 
How right I was ! How right I was ! 
54 



Broadmindedness 

HOW narrow his vision, how cribbed and 
confined ! 
How prejudiced all of his views ! 
How hard is the shell of his bigoted mind ! 
How difficult he to excuse ! 



His face should be slapped and his head 
should be banged; 
A person like that ought to die ! 
I want to be fair, but a man should be 
hanged 
Who's any less liberal than I. 



55 



The Jazzy Bard 

LABOR is a thing I do not like; 
Workin's makes me want to go on 
strike ; 
Sittin' in an office on a sunny afternoon, 
Thinkin' o' nothin' but a ragtime tune. 



'Cause I got the blues, I said I got the blues, 

I got the paragraphic blues. 

Been a-sittin' here since ha' pas' ten, 

Bitin' a hole in my fountain pen; 

Brain's all stiff in the creakin' joints, 

Can't make up no wheezes on the Fourteen 

Points ; 
Can't think o' nothin' 'bout the end o' booze, 
'Cause I got the para — , I said the para- 
graphic, I mean the column conductin' 
blues. 



56 



Lines on and from "Bartlett's 
Familiar Quotations" 



("Sir: For the first time in twenty-three years 'Bart- 
lett's Familiar Quotations' has been revised and en- 
larged, and under separate cover we are sending you a 
copy of the new edition. We would appreciate an 
expression of opinion from you of the value of this 
work after you have had an ample opportunity of 
examining it." — The Publishers.) 



OF making many books there is no end — 
So Sancho Panza said, and so say I. 
Thou wert my guide, philosopher and friend 
When only one is shining in the sky. 



Books cannot always please, however good; 

The good is oft interred with their bones. 
To be great is to be misunderstood, 

The anointed sovereign of sighs and groans. 



The Moving Finger writes, and, having writ, 
I never write as funny as I can. 

Remote, unfriended, studious let me sit 
And say to all the world, "This was a 
man !" 



Go, lovely Rose that lives its little hour! 

Go, little booke ! and let who will be clever ! 
Roll on! From yonder ivy-mantled tower 

The moon and I could keep this up forever. 

57 



Thoughts in a Far Country 

I RISE and applaud, in the patriot manner, 
Whenever (as often) I hear 
The palpitant strains of "The Star Spangled 
Banner," — 

I shout and cheer. 



And also, to show my unbounded devotion, 

I jump to me feet with a "Wheel" 
Whenever "Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean" 
Is played near me. 

My fervour's so hot and my ardour so sear- 
ing— 
I'm hoarse for a couple of days — 
You've heard me, I'm positive, joyously 
cheering 

"The Marseillaise." 

I holler for "Dixie." I go off my noodle, 

I whistle, I pound, and I stamp 
Whenever an orchestra plays "Yankee 
Doodle," 

Or "Tramp, Tramp, Tramp." 

But if you would enter my confidence, Reader, 

Know that I'd go clean off my dome, 

And madly embrace any orchestra leader 

For "Home, Sweet Home." 

58 



When You Meet a Man from Your 
Own Home Town 

SING, O Muse, in the treble clef, 
A little song of the A. E. R, 
And pardon me, please, if I give vent 
To something akin to sentiment. 
But we have our moments Over Here 
When, we want to cry and we want to cheer; 
And the hurrah feeling will not down 
When you meet a man from your own home 
town. 

It's many a lonesome, longsome day 
Since you embarked from the U. S. A., 
And you met some men — it's a great big 

war — 
From towns that you never had known be- 
fore; 
And you landed here, and your rest camp 

mate 
Was a man from some strange and distant 

state. 
Liked him? Yes; but you wanted to see 
A man from the town where you used to be. 

And then you went, by design or chance, 
All over the well-known map of France; 
And you yearned with a yearn that grew and 

grew 
Tc talk with a man from the burg you knew. 
And some lugubrious morning when 

59 



Something Else Again 

Your morale is batting about .no, 

" Where are you from?" and you make reply, 

And the O. D. warrior says, "So am I." 

The universe wears a smiling face 

As you spill your talk of the old home place; 

You talk of the streets, and the home town 

jokes, 
And you find that you know each other's 

folks ; 
And you haven't any more woes at all 
As you both decide that the world is small — 
A statement adding to its renown 
When you meet a man from your own home 

town. 

You may be among the enlisted men, 
You may be a Lieut, or a Major-Gen.; 
Your home may be up in the Chilkoot Pass, 
In Denver, Col., or in Pittsfield, Mass.; 
You may have come from Chicago, 111., 
Buffalo, Portland, or Louisville — 
But there's nothing, I'm gambling, can keep 

you down, 
When you meet a man from your own home 

town. 

jjc j|c sfc sfc 

If you want to know why I wrote this pome, 
Well . . . I've just had a talk with a guy from 
home. 

60 



The Shepherd's Resolution 

If she be not so to me, 

What care I how fair she be? 

— Wither. 

by our own jerome d. kern, author of 
"you're HERE and i'm here" 

I DON'T care if a girl is fair 
If she doesn't seem beautiful to me, 
I won't waste away if she's fair as day, 
Or prettier than meadows in the month of 

May; 
As long as you are there for me to see, 
I don't care and you don't care 
How many others are beyond compare — 
You're the only one I like to have around. 

I won't mind if she's everything combined, 

If she doesn't seem wonderful to me, 

I won't fret if she's everybody's pet, 

Or considered by all as the one best bet; 

As long as you and I are only we, 

I don't care and you don't care 

How many others are beyond compare, 

You're the only one I like to have around. 



61 



"It Was a Famous Victory" 
(1944) 

IT was a summer evening; 
Old Kaspar was at home, 
Sitting before his cottage door — 

Like in the Southey pome — 
And near him, with a magazine, 
Idled his grandchild, Geraldine. 

"Why don't you ask me," Kaspar said 

To the child upon the floor, 
"Why don't you ask me what I did 

When I was in the war? 
They told me that each little kid 
Would surely ask me what I did. 

"I've had my story ready 

For thirty years or more. ,, 
"Don't bother, Grandpa," said the child; 

"I find such things a bore. 
Pray leave me to my magazine," 
Asserted little Geraldine. 



Then entered little Peterkin, 

To whom his gaffer said: 
"You'd like to hear about the war? 

How I was left for dead?" 
"No. And, besides," declared the youth, 
"How do I know you speak the truth ?" 
62 



On Profiteering 

Arose that wan, embittered man, 

The hero of this pome, 
And walked, with not unsprightly step, 

Down to the Soldiers' Home, 
Where he, with seven other men, 
Sat swapping lies till half-past ten. 



On Profiteering 

ALTHOUGH I hate 
A profiteer 
With unabat- 

Ed loathing; 
Though I detest 

The price they smear 
On pants and vest 
And clothing; 



Yet I admit 

My meed of crime, 
Nor do one whit 

Regret it; 
I'd triple my 

Price for a rhyme, 
If I thought I 

Could get it. 

63 



Despite 

THE terrible things that the Governor 
Of Kansas says alarm me; 
And yet somehow we won the war 
In spite of the Regular Army. 



The things they say of the old N. G. 

Are bitter and cruel and hard; 
And yet we walloped the enemy 

In spite of the National Guard. 

Too late, too late, was our work begun; 

Too late were our forces sent; 
And yet we smeared the horrible Hun 

In spite of the President. 

"What a frightful flivver this Baker is !" 
Cried many a Senator; ^ 

And yet we handed the Kaiser his 
In spite of the Sec. of War. 

A sadly incompetent, sinful crew 

Is that of the recent fight; 
And yet we put it across, we do, 

In spite of a lot of spite. 



6 4 



The Return of the Soldier 

LADY, when I left you 
Ere I sailed the sea. 
Bitterly bereft you 
Told me you would be. 

Frequently and often 
When I fought the foe, 

How my heart would soften, 
Pitying your woe! 

Still, throughout my yearning, 

It was my belief 
That my mere returning 

Would annul your grief. 

Arguing ex parte, 

Maybe you can tell 
Why I find your heart A. 

W. O. L. " 



65 



"I Remember, I Remember" 

1 REMEMBER, I remember 
The house where I was born; 
The rent was thirty-two a month, 
Which made my father mourn. 
He said he could remember when 
His father paid the rent; 
And when a man's expenses did 
Not take his every cent. 



I remember, I remember — 

My mother telling my cousin 

That eggs had gone to twenty-six 

Or seven cents a dozen : 

And how she told my father that 

She didn't like to speak 

Of things like that, but Bridget now 

Demanded four a week. 



I remember, I remember — 
And with a mirthless laugh — 
My weekly board at college took 
A jump to three and a half. 
I bought an eighteen-dollar suit, 
And father told me, "Sonny. 
I'll pay the bill this time, but, Oh, 
I am not made of money !" 
66 



r 7 Remember, I Remember 9 ' 

I remember, I remember, 

When I was young and brave 

And I declared, "Well, Birdie, we 

Shall now begin to save." 

It was a childish ignorance, 

But now 'tis little joy 

To know I'm farther off from wealth 

Than when I was a boy. 



67 



The Higher Education 

(Harvard's prestige in football is a leading factor. 
The best players in the big preparatory schools prefer 
to study at Cambridge, where they can earn fame on 
the gridiron. They do not care to be identified with 
Yale and Princeton. — Joe Vila in the Evening Sun.) 

FATHER," began the growing youth, 
"Your pleading finds me deaf; 
Although I know you speak the truth 

About the course at Shef. 
But think you that I have no pride, 

To follow such a trail? 
I cannot be identified 
With Princeton or with Yale." 

"Father," began another lad, 

Emerging from his prep; 
46 1 know you are a Princeton grad, 

But the coaches have no pep. 
But though the Princeton profs provide 

Fine courses to inhale; 
I cannot be identified 

With Princeton or with Yale." 

"I know," he said, "that Learning helps 

A lot of growing chaps; 
That Yale has William Lyon Phelps, 

And Princeton Edward Capps. 
But while, within the Football Guide, 

The Haughton hosts prevail, 
I cannot be identified 

With Princeton or with Yale.' , 
68 



War and Peace 

THIS war is a terrible thing," he said, 
"With its countless numbers of need- 
less dead; 
A futile warfare it seems to me, 
Fought for no principle I can see. 
Alas, that thousands of hearts should bleed 
For naught but a tyrant's boundless greed !" 

*■■ 1* 5|» *P 

Said the wholesale grocer, in righteous mood, 
As he went to adulterate salable food. 



Spake as follows the merchant king: 

"Isn't this war a disgraceful thing? 

Heartless, cruel, and useless, too; 

It doesn't seem that it can be true. 

Think of the misery, want, and fear ! 

We ought to be grateful we've no war here. 

% ^ 5fc ^ 

"Six a week" — to a girl — "That's flat! 
I can get a thousand to work for that." 



69 



Fifty-Fifty 

FOR something like eleven summers 
I've written things that aimed to teach 
Our careless mealy-mouthed mummers 
To be more sedulous of speech. 



So sloppy of articulation 

So limping and so careless they 

About distinct enunciation, 

Often I don't know what they say. 

The other night an able actor, 
Declaiming of some lines I heard, 

I hailed a public benefactor, 
As I distinguished every word. 

But, oh! the subtle disappointment! 

Thorn on the celebrated rose 
And fly within the well-known ointment ! 

(Allusions everybody knows.) 

Came forth the words exact and snappy. 

And as I sat there, that P.M., 
I mused, "Was I not just as happy 

When I could not distinguish them?" 



70 



"So Shines a Good Deed in a 
Naughty World" 

THERE was a man in our town, and he 
was wondrous rich; 
He gave away his millions to the colleges and 

sich; 
And people cried : "The hypocrite ! He ought 

to understand 
The ones who really need him are the children 
of this land.* 



When Andrew Croesus built a home for chil- 
dren who were sick, 

The people said they rather thought he did it 
as a trick, 

And writers said: "He thinks about the 
drooping girls and boys, 

But what about conditions with the men 
whom he employs?" 



There was a man in our town who said that 

he would share 
His profits with his laborers, for that was 

only fair, 
And people said: "Oh, isn't he the shrewd 

and foxy gent? 
It cost him next to nothing for that free 

advertisement." 

7i 



Something Else Again 

There was a man in our town who had the 

perfect plan 
To do away with poverty and other ills of 

man, 
But he feared the public jeering, and the folks 

who would defame him, 
So he never told the plan he had, and I can 

hardly blame him. 



Vain Words 

HUMBLE, surely, mine ambition; 
It is merely to construct 
Some occasion or condition 
When I may say "usufruct." 

Earnest am I and assiduous; 

Yet I'm certain that I shan't amount 
To a lot till I use "viduous," 

"Indiscerptible," and "tantamount." 



72 



On the Importance of Being 
Earnest 

GENTLE Jane was as good as gold/' 
To borrow a line from Mr. Gilbert ; 
She hated War with a hate untold, 

She was a pacifistic filbert. 
If you said "Perhaps" — she'd leave the hall. 
You couldn't argue with her at all. 

'Teasing Tom was a very bad boy/' 

(Pardon my love for a good quotation). 

To talk of war was his only joy, 
And his single purpose was Preparation. 

# * jfc 5JC * !$S 

And what both of these children had to say 
I never knew, for I ran away. 



73 



It Happens in the B. R. Families 

WITH THE CUSTOMARY OBEISANCES 

'^THWAS on the shores that round our coast 
X From Deal to Newport lie 

That I roused from sleep in a huddled heap 
An elderly wealthy guy. 

His hair was graying, his hair was long, 

And graying and long was he; 
And I heard this grouch on the shore avouch, 

In a singular jazzless key: 



"Oh, I am a cook and a waitress trim 
And the maid of the second floor, 

And a strong chauffeur and a housekeeper, 
And the man who tends the door !" 



And he shook his fists and he tore his hair, 
And he started to frisk and play, 

Till I couldn't help thinking the man had been 
drinking, 
So I said (in the Gilbert way) : 



"Oh, elderly man, I don't know much 

Of the ways of societee, 
But Til eat my friend if I comprehend 

However you can be 
74 



It Happens in the B. R. Families 

"At once a cook and a waitress trim 
And the maid of the second floor, 

And a strong chauffeur and a housekeeper, 
And the man who tends the door." 

Then he smooths his hair with a nervous air, 
And a gulp in his throat he swallows, 

And that elderly guy he then lets fly 
Substantially as follows: 

"We had a house down Newport way, 

And w T e led a simple life; 
There was only I," said the elderly guy, 

"And my daughter and my wife. 

"And of course the cook and the waitress trim 
And the maid of the second floor, 

And a strong chauffeur and a housekeeper. 
And the man who tends the door. 

"One day the cook she up and left, 

She up and left us flat. 
She was getting a hundred and ten a mon- 

Th, but she couldn't work for that. 

"And the waitress trim w r as her bosom friend, 
And she wouldn't stay no more; 

And our strong chauffeur eloped with her 
Who was maid of the second floor. 

75 



Something Else Again 

"And we couldn't get no other help, 

So I had to cook and wait. 
It was quite absurd/' wept the elderly bird. 

"I deserve a better fate. 



"And I drove the car and I made the beds 
Till the housekeeper up and quit; 

And the man at the door found that a bore, 
Which is why I am, to wit: 

"At once a cook and a waitress trim 
And the maid of the second floor, 

And a strong chauffeur and a housekeeper, 
And the man who tends the door." 



76 



Abelard and Heloise 

["There are so many things I want to talk to you 
about."' Abelard probably said to Heloise, "but how can 
I when I can only think about kissing you?" — Kath- 
arine Lane in the Evening Mail.] 

SAID Abelard to Helo'ise: 
"Your tresses blowing in the breeze 
Enchant my soul; your cheek allures; 
I never knew such lips as yours." 



Said Heloise to Abelard: 

"I know that it is cruel, hard, 

To make you fold your yearning arms 

And think of things besides my charms/ 

Said Abelard to Heloise: 
"Pray let's discuss the Portuguese; 
Their status in the League of Nations. 
. . . Come, slip me seven osculations." 



"The Fourteen Points," said Helo'ise, 
"Are pure Woodrovian fallacies." 
Said Abelard: "Ten times fourteen 
The points you have, O beaucoup queen!' 



"Lay off," said Heloise, "all that stuff. 
I've heard the same old thing enough." 
"But," answered Abelard, "your lips 
Put all my thoughts into eclipse." 

77 



Something Else Again 



"O Abelard," said Heloise, 
"Don't take so many liberties." 
"O Heloise," said Abelard, 
"I do it but to show regard." 

And Heloise told her chum that night 
That Abelard was Awful Bright; 
And — thus is drawn the cosmic plan — 
She loved an Intellectual Man. 



78 



Lines Written on the Sunny Side 
of Frankfort Street 

SPORTING with Amaryllis in the shade, 
(I credit Milton in parenthesis), 
Among the speculations that she made 
Was this: 



"When" — these her very words — "when you 
return, 
A slave to duty's harsh commanding call, 
Will you, I wonder, ever sigh and yearn 
At all?" 



Doubt, honest doubt, sat then upon my brow. 

(Emotion is a thing I do not plan.) 
I could not fairly answer then, but now 
I can. 



Yes, Amaryllis, I can tell you this, 

Can answer publicly and unafraid: 
You haven't any notion how I miss 
The shade. 



79 



Fifty-Fifty 



[We think about the feminine faces we meet in the 
streets, and experience a passing melancholy because 
we are unacquainted with some of the girls we see. — 
From "The Erotic Motive in Literature," by Albert 
Mordell.] 

WHENE'ER I take my walks abroad, 
How many girls I see 
Whose form and features I applaud 
With well-concealed glee ! 



Fd speak to many a sonsie maid, 

Or willowy or obese, 
Were I not fearful, and afraid 

She'd yell for the police. 

And Melancholy, bittersweet, 
Marks me then as her own, 

Because I lack the nerve to greet 
The girls I might have known. 

Yet though with sadness I am fraught, 

(As I remarked before), 
There is one sweetly solemn thought 

Comes to me o'er and o'er: 



For every shadow cloud of woe 

Hath argentine alloy; 
I see some girls I do not know, 

And feel a passing joy. 
80 



To Myrtilla 

TWELVE fleeting years ago, my Myrt, 
(Eheu fugaces! maybe more) 
I wrote of the directoire skirt 
You wore. 

Ten years ago, Myrtilla mine, 

The hobble skirt engaged my pen. 
That was, I calculate, in Nine- 
Teen Ten. 

The polo coat, the feathered lid, 

The phony furs of yesterfall, 
The current shoe — I tried to kid 
Them all. 

Vain every vitriolic bit, 

Silly all my sulphuric song. 
Rube Goldberg said a bookful; it 
'S air wrong. 

Bitter the words I used to fling, 

But you, despite my angriest Note, 
Were never swayed by anything 
I wrote. 

So I surrender. I am beat. 

And, though the admission rather girds, 
In any garb you're just too sweet 
For words. 
81 



A Psalm of Labouring Life 

TELL me not, in doctored numbers, 
Life is but a name for work ! 
For the labour that encumbers 
Me I wish that I could shirk. 

Life is phony! Life is rotten! 

And the wealthy have no soul; 
Why should you be picking cotton? 

Why should I be mining coal? 

Not employment and not sorrow 
Is my destined end or way; 

But to act that each to-morrow 
Finds me idler than to-day. 

Work is long, and plutes are lunching; 

Money is the thing I crave; 
But my heart continues punching 

Funeral time-clocks to the grave. 

In the world's uneven battle, 
In the swindle known as life, 

Be not like the stockyards cattle — 
Stick your partner with a knife ! 

Trust no Boss, however pleasant ! 

Capital is but a curse! 
Strike,— strike in the living present! 

Fill, oh fill, the bulging purse ! 
82 



A Psalm of Labouring Life 

Lives of strikers all remind us 
We can make our lives a crime, 

And, departing, leave behind us 
Bills for double overtime. 



Charges that, perhaps another, 
Working for a stingy ten 

Bucks a day, some mining brother 
Seeing, shall walk out again. 

Let us, then, be up and striking, 
Discontent with all of it; 

Still undoing, still disliking, 
Learn to labour — and to quit. 



83 



Ballade of Ancient Acts 

AFTER HENLEY 

WHERE are the wheezes they essayed 
And where the smiles they made to 
flow? 
Where's Caron's seltzer siphon laid, 
A squirt from which laid Herbert low? 
Where's Charlie Case's comic woe 
And Georgie Cohan's nasal drawl? 
The afterpiece? The olio? 
Into the night go one and all 

Where are the j aperies, fresh or frayed, 
That Fields and Lewis used to throw? 
Where is the horn that Shepherd played? 
The slide trombone that Wood would blow? 
Amelia Glover's 1. f. toe? 
The Rays and their domestic brawl? 
Bert Williams with "Oh, / Don't Know?" 
Into the night go one and all. 

Where's Lizzie Raymond, peppy jade? 
The braggart Lew, the simple Joe? 
And where the Irish servant maid 
That Jimmie Russell used to show? 
Charles Sweet, who tore the paper snow? 
Ben Harney's where? And Artie Hall? 
Nash Walker, Darktown's grandest beau? 
Into the night go one and all. 

84 



To a Prospective Cook 



LENVOI 



Prince, though our children laugh "Ho ! Ho !" 
At us who gleefully would fall 
For acts that played the Long Ago, 
Into the night go one and all. 



To a Prospective Cook 

CURLY Locks, Curly Locks, wilt thou be 
ours? 
Thou shalt not wash dishes, nor yet weed the 

flowers, 
But stand in the kitchen and cook a fine meal, 
And ride every night in an automobile. 

Curly Locks, Curly Locks, come to us soon ! 
Thou needst not to rise until mid-afternoon; 
Thou mayst be Croatian, Armenian, or Greek ; 
Thy guerdon shall be what thou askest per 
week. 

Curly Locks, Curly Locks, give us a chance! 
Thou shalt not wash windows, nor iron my 

pants. 
Oh, come to the cosiest of seven-room bowers, 
Curly Locks, Curly Locks, wilt thou be ours? 

85 



Variation on a Theme 

June 30, 19 19. 

NOTABLY fond of music, I dote on a 
clearer tone 
Than ever was blared by a bugle or zoomed 

by a saxophone; 
And the sound that opens the gates for me of 

a Paradise revealed 
Is something akin to the note revered by the 

blessed Eugene Field, 
Who sang in pellucid phrasing that I perfectly 

well recall 
Of the clink of the ice in the pitcher that the 

boy brings up the hall. 
But sweeter to me than the sparrow's song or 

the goose's autumn honks 
Is the sound of the ice in the shaker as the 

barkeeper mixes a Bronx. 



Between the dark and the daylight, when I'm 

worried about The Tower, 
Comes a pause in the day's tribulations that 

is known as the cocktail hour; 
And my soul is sad and jaded, and my heart 

is a thing forlorn, 
And I view the things I have written with a 

sickening, scathing scorn. 
Oh, it's then I fare with some other slave who 

is hired for the things he writes 
86 



Variation on a Theme 

To a Den of Sin where they mingle gin — such 
as Lipton's, Mouquin's, or Whyte's, 

And my spirit thrills to a music sweeter than 
Sullivan or Puccini — 

The swash of the ice in the shaker as he mixes 
a Dry Martini. 



The drys will assert that metallic sound is the 

selfsame canon made 
By the ice in the shaker that holds a drink 

like orange or lemonade; 
But on the word of a travelled man and a 

bard who has been around, 
The sound of tin on ice and gin is a snappier, 

happier sound. 
And I mean to hymn, as soon as I have a 

moment of leisure time, 
The chill susurrus ofcocktail ice in an ade- 
quate piece of rhyme. 
But I've just had an invitation to hark, at a 

beckoning bar, 
To the sound of the ice in the shaker as the 

barkeeper mixes a Star. 



s 7 



"Such Stuff as Dreams" 

JENNY kiss'd me in a dream; 
So did Elsie, Lucy, Cora, 
Bessie, Gwendolyn, Eupheme, 
Alice, Adelaide, and Dora. 
Say of honour I'm devoid, 

Say monogamy has miss'd me, 
But don't say to Dr. Freud 
Jenny kiss'd me. 



88 



The Ballad of Justifiable Homicide 

THEY brought to me his mangled corpse 
And I feared lest I should swing. 
"O tell me, tell me, — and make it brief — 
Why hast thou done this thing? 



"Had this man robbed the starving poor 

Or lived a gunman's life, 
Had he set fire to cottages, 

Or run off with thy wife?" 

"He hath not robbed the starving poor, 

Nor lived a gunman's life; 
He hath set fire to no cottage, 

Nor run off with my wife. 

"Ye ask me such a question that 

It now my lips unlocks: 
I learned he was the man who planned 

The second balcony box." 

The jury pondered never an hour, 
They thought not even a little, 

But handed in unanimously 
A verdict of acquittal. 



89 



The Ballad of the Murdered 
Merchant 

ALL stark and cold the merchant lay, 
All cold and stark lay he. 
And who hath killed this fair merchant f 
Now tell the truth to me. 



Oh, I have killed this fair merchant 
Will never again draw breath; 

Oh, I have made this fair merchant 
To come unto his death. 



Oh, why hast thou killed this fair merchant 

Whose corse I now behold ? 
And why hast caused this man to lie 

In death all stark and cold? 



Oh, I have killed this fair merchant 
Whose kith and kin make moan, 

For that he hath stolen my precious time 
When he useth the telephone. 



The telephone bell rang full and clear; 

The receiver did I seize. 
"Hello I" quoth I, and quoth a girl, 

"Hello ! . . . One moment, please." 
90 



The Ballad of the Murdered Merchant 

I waited moments ane and twa, 
And moments three and four, 

And then I sought that fair merchant 
And spilled his selfish gore. 



That business man who scorneth to waste 
His moments sae rich and fine 

In calling a man to the telephone 
Shall never again waste mine! 



And every time a henchwoman 
Shall cause me a moment's loss, 

I'll forthwith fare to that office 
And stab to death her boss. 



Rise up ! Rise up Lthou blessed knight ! 

And off thy bended knees ! 
Go forth and slay all folk who make 

Us wait "One moment, please." 



91 



A Gotham Garden of Verses 



IN summer when the days are hot 
The subway is delayed a lot; 
In winter, quite the selfsame thing; 
In autumn also, and in spring. 

And does it not seem strange to you 
That transportation is askew 
In this — I pray, restrain your mirth ! — 
In this, the Greatest Town on Earth? 



II 



All night long and every night 
The neighbours dance for my delight; 
I hear the people dance and sing 
Like practically anything. 

Women and men and girls and boys, 
All making curious kinds of noise 
And dancing in so weird a way, 
I never saw the like by day. 

So loud a show was never heard 
As that which yesternight occurred: 
They danced and sang, as I have said, 
As I lay wakeful on my bed. 
92 



A Gotham Garden of Verses 

They shout and cry and yell and laugh 
And play upon the phonograph; 
And endlessly I count the sheep, 
Endeavouring to fall asleep. 



Ill 



It is very nice to think 
This town is full of meat and drink; 
That is, Fd think it very nice 
If my papa but had the price. 



IV 



This town is so full of a number of folks, 
I'm sure there will always be matter for 
jokes. 



93 



Lines on Reading Frank J 

Wilstach's "A Dictionary 

of Similes" 

AS neat as wax, as good as new, 
As true as steel, as truth is true, 
Good as a sermon, keen as hate, 
Full as a tick, and fixed as fate — 

Brief as a dream, long as the day, 
Sweet as the rosy morn in May, 
Chaste as the moon, as snow is white, 
Broad as barn doors, and new as sight — 

Useful as daylight, firm as stone, 
Wet as a fish, dry as a bone, 
Heavy as lead, light as a breeze- 
Frank Wilstach's book of similes. 



94 



The Dictaphone Bard 

[And here i9 a suggestion: Did you ever try dic- 
tating your stories or articles to the dictaphone for the 
first draft? I would be glad to have you come down 
and make the experiment. — From a shorthand reporter's 
circular letter.] 

(As "The Ballad of the Tempest" would have 
to issue from the dictaphone to the stenog- 
rapher) 

Begin each line with a capital. Indent al- 
ternate lines. Double space after each fourth 
line. 

FJ/'E were crowded in the cabin comma 
Vr Not a soul woidd dare to sleep 

dash comma 
It was midnight on the waters comma 
And a storm was on the deep period 

Apostrophe Tis a fearful thing in capital 
Winter 
To be shattered by the blast comma 
And to hear the rattling trumpet 

Thunder colon quote capital Cut away the 
mast exclamation point close quote 

So we shuddered there in silence comma dash 

For the stoutest held his breath comma 
While the hungry sea was roaring comma 
And the breakers talked with capital Death 
period 

95 



Something Else Again 

As thus we sat in darkness comma 
Each one busy with his prayers comma 

Quote We are lost exclamation point close 

quote the captain shouted comma 

As he staggered down the stairs period 

But his little daughter whispered comma 

As she took his icy hand colon 
Quote Isn't capital God upon the ocean com- 
ma 
Just the same as on the land interrogation 
point close quote 

Then we kissed the little maiden comma 
And we spake in better cheer comma 

And we anchored safe in harbor 

When the morn was shining clear period 



96 



The Comfort of Obscurity 



INSPIRED BY READING MR. KIPLING'S POEMS AS 
PRINTED IN THE NEW YORK PAPERS 



THOUGH earnest and industrious, 
I still am unillustrious ; 
No papers empty purses 
Printing verses 
Such as mine. 
No lack of fame is chronicker 
Than that about my monicker; 
My verse is never cabled 
At a fabled 

Rate per line. 

Still though the Halls 
Of Literature are closed 
To me a bard obscure I 
Have a consolation The 
Copyreaders crude and rough 
Can't monkey with my 
Humble stuff and change MY 
Punctuation. 



97 



Ballade of the Traffickers 

UP goes the price of our bread — 
Up goes the cost of our caking! 
People must ever be fed; 
Bakers must ever be baking. 
So, though our nerves may be quaking, 
Dumbly, in arrant despair, 
Pay we the crowd that is taking 
All that the traffic will bear. 



Costly to sleep in a bed! 
Costlier yet to be waking! 
Costly for one who is wed! 
Ruinous for one who is raking! 
Tradespeople, ducking and draking, 
Charge you as much as they dare, 
Asking, without any faking, 
All that the traffic will bear. 



Roof that goes over our head, 
Thirst so expensive for slaking, 
Paper, apparel, and lead — 
Why are their prices at breaking? 
Yet, though our purses be aching, 
Little the traffickers care; 
Getting, for chopping and steaking, 
All that the traffic will bear. 
98 



Ballade of the Traffickers 



l'envoi 



Take thou my verses, I pray, King, 
Letting my guerdon be fair. 
Even a bard must be making 
All that the traffic will bear. 



99 



To W. Hohenzollern, on Discon- 
tinuing The Conning Tower 

WILLIAM, it was, I think, three years 
ago — 
As I recall, one cool October morning — 
(You have The Tribune files; I think they'll 
show 

I gave you warning). 



I said, in well-selected words and terse, 

In phrases balanced, yet replete with power, 
That I should cease to pen the prose and verse 
Known as The Tower. 



That I should stop this Labyrinth of Light — 
Though stopping make the planet leaden- 
hearted — 
Unless you stopped the well-known Schreck- 
lichkeit 

Your nation started. 



I printed it in type that you could read; 
My paragraphs were thewed, my rhymes 
were sinewed. 
You paid, I judge from what ensued, no 
heed . . . 

The war continued, 
ioo 



To W. Hoherusottem 

And though my lines with fortitude were 
fraught, 
Although my words were strong, and 
stripped of stuffing, 
You, William, thought — oh, yes, you did — you 
thought 

That I was bluffing. 



You thought that I would fail to see it 
through ! 
You thought that, at the crux of things, I'd 
cower ! 
How little, how imperfectly you knew 
The Conning Tower! 



You'll miss the column at the break of day. 
I have no fear that I shall be forgotten. 
You'll miss the daily privilege to say: 
"That stuff is rotten!" 



Or else — as sometimes has occurred — when I 
Have chanced upon a lucky line to blunder, 
You'll miss the precious privilege to cry: 
"That bird's a wonder !" 

IOI 



Something Else Again 

Well, William, when your people cease to 
strafe, 
When you have put an end to all this war 
stuff, 
When all the world is reasonably safe, 
Til write some more stuff. 



And when you miss the quip and wanton wile, 
And learn you can't endure the Towerless 
season, 
O William, I shall not be petty . . . Ill 
Listen to reason. 

October 5, 1917. 



102 



To W. Hohenzollern, on Resuming 
The Conning Tower 



w 



ELL, William, since I wrote you long 



As I recall, one cool October morning — 
(I have The Tribune files. They clearly show 
I gave you warning.) 



Since when I penned that consequential ode, 
The world has seen a vast amount of 
slaughter, 
And under many a Gallic bridge has flowed 
A lot of water. 



I said that when your people ceased to strafe, 
That when you'd put an end to all this war 
stuff, 
And all the world was reasonably safe 
I'd write some more stuff; 



That when you missed the quip and wanton 
wile 
And learned you couldn't bear a Towerless 
season, 
I quote: "O, I shall not be petty. . . . I'll 
Listen to reason." 
103 



Something Else Again 

Labuntur anni, not to say Eheu 

Fugaces! William, by my shoulders glisten- 
ing! 
I have the final laugh, for it was you 
Who did the listening. 

January 15, 19 19. 



104 



Thoughts on the Cosmos 



I 



1DO not hold with him who thinks 
The world is jonahed by a jinx; 
That everything is sad and sour, 
And life a withered hothouse flower. 



II 



I hate the Pollyanna pest 
Who says that All Is for the Best, 
And hold in high, unhidden scorn 
Who sees the Rose, nor feels the Thorn, 



III 



I do not like extremists who 
Are like the pair in (I) and (II); 
But how I hate the wabbly gink, 
Like me, who knows not w r hat to think ! 



i°5 



On Environment 

I USED to think that this environ- 
Ment talk was all a lot of guff; 
Place mattered not with Keats and Byron 
Stuff. 



If I have thoughts that need disclosing, 
Bright be the day or hung with gloom, 
I'll write in Heaven or the composing- 
Room. 



Times are when with my nerves a-tingle, 

Joyous and bright the songs I sing; 
Though, gay, I can't dope out a single 
Thing. 

And yet, by way of illustration, 

The gods my graying head anoint . . . 
I wrote this piece at Inspiration 
Point. 



106 



The Ballad of the Thoughtless 
Waiter 

I SAW him lying cold and dead 
Who yesterday was whole. 
"Why," I inquired, "hath he expired? 
And why hath fled his soul?" 



"But yesterday," his comrade said, 
"All health was his, and strength; 

And this is why he came to die — 
If I may speak at length. 



"But yesternight at dinnertime 
At a not unknown cafe, 

He had a frugal meal as you 
Might purchase any day. 



"The check for his so simple fare 

Was only eighty cents, 
And a dollar bill with a right good will 

Came from his opulence. 



"The waiter brought him twenty cents. 

'Twas only yesternight 
That he softly said who now is dead 

'Oh, keep it. 'At's a' right.' 
107 



Something Else Again 

"And the waiter plainly uttered 'Thanks/ 
With no hint of scorn or pride; 

And my comrade's heart gave a sudden start 
And my comrade up and died." 



Now waiters overthwart this land, 
In tearooms and in dives, 

Mute be your lips whatever the tips, 
And save your customers' lives. 



108 



Rus Vs. Urbs 

WHENE'ER the penner of this pome 
Regards a lovely country home, 
He sighs, in words not insincere, 
"I think I'd like to live out here." 



And when the builder of this ditty 
Returns to this pulsating city, 
The perpetrator of this pome 
Yearns for a lovely country home. 



109 



"I'm Out of the Army Now" 

WHEN first I doffed my olive drab, 
I thought, delightedly though mutely, 
"Henceforth I shall have pleasure ab- 
solutely." 



Dull with the drudgery of war, 
Sick of the very name of fighting, 
I yearned, I thought, for something more 
Exciting. 



The rainbow be my guide, quoth I; 
My suit shall be a brave and proud one 
Gay-hued my socks; and oh, my tie 
A loud one ! 



For me the theatre and the dance; 
Primrose the path I would be wending; 
For me the roses of romance 
Unending. 



Those were my inner thoughts that day 
(And those of many another million) 
When once again I should be a 
Civilian, 
no 



"I'm Out of the Army Now' 

I would not miss the old o. d. ; 
(Monotony I didn't much like) 
I would not miss the reveille, 
And such like. 



I don't . . . And do I now enjoy 
My walks along the primrose way so? 
Is civil life the life? Oh, boy, 
I'll say so. 



Ill 



"Oh Man!" 

MAN hath harnessed the lightning; 
Man hath soared to the skies; 
Mountain and hill are clay to his will; 
Skilful he is, and wise. 
Sea to sea hath he wedded, 

Canceled the chasm of space, 
Given defeat to cold and heat; 
Splendour is his, and grace. 



His are the topless turrets; 

His are the plumbless pits; 
Earth is slave to his architrave, 

Heaven is thrall to his wits. 
And so in the golden future, 

He who hath dulled the storm 
(As said above) may make a glove 

That'll keep my fingers warm. 



112 



An Ode in Time of Inauguration 

(March 4, 1913) 

THINE aid, O Muse, I consciously be- 
seech ; 
I crave thy succour, ask for thine assist- 
ance 
That men may cry: "Some little ode! A 
peach !" 
O Muse, grant me the strength to go the 
distance ! 
For odes, I learn, are dithyrambs, and long; 

Exalted feeling, dignity of theme 
And complicated structure guide the song. 
(All this from Webster's book of high es- 
teem.) 



Let complicated structure not becloud 
My lucid lines, nor weight with overload- 
ing. 
To Shelley, Keats, and Wordsworth and that 
crowd 
I yield the bays for ground and lofty 
oding. 
Mine but the task to trace a country's growth, 

As evidenced by each inauguration 
From Washington's to Wilson's primal 
oath — 
In these U. S., the celebrated nation. 
113 



Something Else Again 

But stay! or ever that I start to sing, 

Or e'er I loose my fine poetic forces, 
I ought, I think, to do the decent thing, 

To wit : give credit to my many sources : 
Barnes's "Brief History of the U. S. A.," 

Bryce, Ridpath, Scudder, Fiske, J. B. Mc- 
Master, 
A book of odes, a Webster, a Roget — 

The bibliography of this poetaster. 

Flow, flow, my pen, as gently as sweet Afton 

ever flowed! 
An thou dost ill, shall this be still a poor 

thing, but mine ode. 

G. W., initial prex, 

Right down in Wall Street, New York 
City, 
Took his first oath. Oh, multiplex 

The whimsies quaint, the comments witty 
One might evolve from that! I scorn 
To mock the spot where he was sworn. 

On next Inauguration Day 

He took the avouchment sempiternal 
Way down in Phil-a-delph-i-a, 

Where rises now the L. H. Journal. 
His Farewell Speech in '96 
Said: "'Ware the Trusts and all their 
tricks !" 

114 



An Ode in Time of Inauguration 

John Adams fell on darksome days: 
March Fourth was blustery and sleety; 

The French behaved in horrid ways 
Until John Jay drew up a treaty. 

Came the Eleventh Amendment, too, 

Providing that — but why tell you? 



T. Jefferson, one history showed, 
Held all display was vain and idle; 

Alone, unpanoplied, he rode; 

Alone he hitched his horse's bridle. 

No ball that night, and no carouse, 

But back to Conrad's boarding house. 



He tied that bridle to the fence 

The morning of inauguration; 
John Davis saw hirr^do it; whence 

Arose his "simple" reputation. 
The White House, though, with Thomas J., 
Had chefs— and parties every day. 



The Muse Interrupts the Odist 

If I were you I think I'd change my medium; 

I weary of your meter and your style. 
The sameness of it sickens me to tedium; 

I'll quit unless you switch it for a while. 
115 



Something Else Again 

The Odist Replies 

I bow to thee, my Muse, most eloquent of 

pleaders ; 
But why embarrass me in front of all these 

readers ? 

Madison's inauguration 

Was a lovely celebration. 

In a suit of wool domestic 

Rode he, stately and majestic, 

Making it be manifest 

Clothes American are best. 

This has thundered through the ages. 

(See our advertising pages.) 

Lightly I pass along, and so 

Come to the terms of James Monroe 

Who framed the doctrine far too well 

Known for an odist to retell. 

His period of friendly dealing 

Began The Era of Good Feeling. 

John Quincy Adams followed him in Eighteen 
Twenty- four ; 

Election was exciting— the details I shall ig- 
nore. 

But his inauguration as our country's Presi- 
dent 

116 



An Ode in Time of Inauguration 

Was, take it from McMaster, some consider- 
able event. 

It was a brilliant function, and I think I 
ought to add 

The Philadelphia "Ledger" said a gorgeous 
time was had. 



Old Andrew Jackson's pair of terms were 

terribly exciting; 
That stern, intrepid warrior had little else 

than fighting. 
A time of strife and turbulence, of politics 

and flurry. 
But deadly dull for poem themes, so, Maw- 

russ, I should worry! 

In Washington did Martin Van 

A stately custom then decree: 
Old Hickory, the veteran, 
Must ride with him, the people's man, 

For all the world to see. 
A pleasant custom, in a way, 

And yet I should have laughed 
To see the Sage of Oyster Bay 

On Tuesday ride with Taft. 
(Pardon me this 

Parenthetical halt: 
That sight you'll miss, 

But it isn't my fault.) 
117 



Something Else "Again 

William Henry Harrison came 

Riding a horse of alabaster, 
But the weather that day was a sin and a 
shame, 

Take it from me and John McMaster. 
Only a month — and Harrison died, 
And V.-P. Tyler began preside. 
A far from popular prex was he, 
And the next one was Polk of Tennessee. 
There were two inaugural balls for him, 
But the rest of his record is rather dim. 

Had I the pen of a Pope or a Thackeray, 

Had I the wisdom of Hegel or Kant, 
Then might I sing as I'd like to of Zachary, 

Then might I sing a Taylorian chant. 
Oh, for the lyrical art of a Tennyson! 

Oh, for the skill of Macaulay or Burke ! 
None of these mine; so I give him my beni- 
son, 

Turning reluctantly back to my work. 

Millard Fillmore! when a man refers 

To thee, what direful, awful thing occurs? 
Though in itself thy name hath nought of wit, 
Yet — and this doth confound me to admit 
When I do hear it, I do smile; nay, more — 

1 laugh, I scream, I cachinnate, I roar 

As Wearied Business Men do shake with glee 

118 



An Ode in Time of Inauguration 

At mimes that say "Dubuque" or "Kanka- 
kee"; 

As basement-brows that laugh at New Ro- 
chelle ; 

As lackwits laugh when actors mention Hell. 

Perhaps — it may be so — I am not sure — 

Perhaps it is that thou wast so obscure, 

And that one seldom hears a single word of 
thee; 

I know a lot of girls that never heard of 
thee. 

Hence did I smile, perhaps. . . . How very 
near 

The careless laughing to the thoughtful tear ! 

Fillmore, let me sheathe my mocking pen. 
God rest thee ! I'll not laugh at thee again ! 

1 have heard it remarked that to Pierce's 

election 
There wasn't a soul had the slightest objec- 
tion. 
I have also been told, by some caustical wit, 
That no one said nay when he wanted to 
quit. 
Yet Franklin Pierce, forgotten man, 

I celebrate your fame. 
I'm doing just the best I can 

To keep alive your name, 
Though as a President, F. P., 
You didn't do as much for me. 
119 



Something Else Again 

Of James Buchanan things a score 
I might recite. I'll say that he was 
The only White House bachelor — 
The only one, that's what J. B. was. 
For he was a bachelor — 
For he might have been a bigamist, 
A Mormon, a polygamist, 

And had thirty wives or more; 
But this be his memorial: 
He was ever unuxorial, 

And remained a bachelor — 
He re-mai-ai-ai-ai-ai-ai -ai-ai-ai-ai- 
ained a bachelor. 

Lincoln! I falter, feeling it to be 
As if all words of mine in praise of him 
Were as the veriest dolt that saw the sun; 
And God had spoken him and said to him: 
"I bid you tell me what you think of it." 
And he should answer: "Oh, the sun is nice." 
So sadly fitted I to speak in praise 
Of Lincoln. 

Now during Andrew Johnson's term the cur- 
rency grew stable; 

We bought Alaska and we laid the great At- 
lantic cable; 

And then there came eight years of Grant; 
thereafter four of Hayes; 
120 



An Ode in Time of Inauguration 

And in his time the parties fell on fierce and 
parlous days; 

And Garfield came, and Arthur too, and Con- 
gress shoes were worn, 

And Brooklyn Bridge was built, and I, your 
gifted bard, was born. 



Cleveland and Harrison came along then; 
Followed an era of Cleveland again. 
Came then McKinley and — light me a pipe — 
Hey, there, composing room, get some new 
type! 



/ sing him now as I shall sing him again; 
I sing him now as I have sung before. 
How fluently his name comes off my pen! 
O Theodore! 



Bless you and keep you, T. R.! 

Energy tireless, eternal, 
Fixed and particular star, 

Theodore, Teddy, the Colonel. 

Energy tireless, eternal; 

Hater of grafters and crooks! 
Theodore, Teddy, the Colonel, 

Writer and lover of books. 

121 



Something Else Again 

Hater of grafters and crooks, 
Forceful, adroit, and expressive, 

Writer and lover of books, 
Nevertheless a Progressive. 



Forceful, adroit, and expressive, 

Often asserting the trite; 
Nevertheless a Progressive; 

Errant, but generally right. 

Often asserting the trite; 

Stubborn, and no one can force you. 
Errant, but generally right — 

Yet, on the whole, I indorse you. 

Stubborn, and no one can force you, 

Fixed and particular star, 
Yet, on the whole, I indorse you, 

Bless you and keep you, T. R.f 

It blew, it rained, it snowed, it stormed, it 

froze, it hailed, it sleeted 
The day that William Howard Taft upon the 

chair was seated. 
The four long- years that followed-— ah, that 

I should make a rime of it ! 
For Mr. Taft assures me that he had an awful 

time of it. 

122 



An Ode in Time of Inauguration 

And yet meseems he did his best; and as we 

bid good-bye, 
I'll add he did a better job than you'd have 

done — or I. 



Welcome to thee ! I shake thy hand, 
New prexy of our well-known land. 
May what we merit, and no less, 
Descend to give us happiness ! 
May w T hat we merit, and no more, 
Descend on us in measured store ! 
Give us but peace when we shall earn 
The right to such a rich return! 
Give us but plenty when we show 
" That we deserve to have it so ! 



Mine ode is finished ! Tut ! It is a slight one, 

But blame me not; I do as I am bid. 
The editor of Collier's said to write one — 
And I did. 



123 



What the Copy Desk Might 
Have Done to: 

("Annabel Lee") 

SOUL BRIDE ODDLY DEAD 
IN QUEER DEATH PACT 

High-Born Kinsman Abducts 

Girl from Poet -Lover — Flu 

Said to Be Cause- of Death— 

Grand Jury to Probe 



Annabel L. Poe, of 1834^ 3rd 

Av., the beautiful young fiancee 

of Edmund Allyn Poe, a maga- 
zine writer from the South, was found 
dead early this morning on the beach 
off E. 8th St. 

Poe seemed prostrated and, questioned 
by the police, said that one of her aris- 
tocratic relatives had taken her to the 
"seashore," but that the cold winds had 
given her "flu," from which she never 
"rallied." 

Detectives at work on the case believe, 
they say, that there was a suicide com- 
pact between the Poes and that Poe 
also intended to do away with himself. 

He refused to leave the spot where the 
woman's body had been found. 
124 



("Curfew Must Not Ring To-night") 

GIRL, HUMAN BELL-CLAPPER, 

SAVES DOOMED LOVER'S LIEE 

BRAVE ACT OF "BESSIE" SMITH 

HALTS CURFEW FROM RINGING 

AND MELT5 CROMWELL'S 

HEART 

(By Cable to The Courier) 

HUDDERSFIELD, KENT, ENG- 
LAND. — Jan. 15. — Swinging far out 
above the city, "Bessie" Smith, the 
young and beautiful fiancee of Basil 
Underwood, a prisoner incarcerated in 
the town jail, saved his life to-night. 

The woman went to "Jack" Heming- 
way, sexton of the First M. E. Church, 
and asked him to refrain from ringing 
the curfew bell last night, as Under- 
wood^ execution had been set for the 
hour when the. bell was to ring. Hem- 
ingway refused, alleging it to be his 
duty to ring the bell. 

With a quick step Miss Smith bounded 
forward, sprang within the old church 
door, left the old man threading slowly 
paths which previously he had trodden, 
and mounted up to the tower. Climbing 
the dusty ladder in the dark, she is said 
to have whispered : 

"Curfew is not to ring this evening." 

Seizing the heavy tongue of the bell, 
as it was about to moye, she swung far 
out suspended in mid-air, oscillating, 
thus preventing the bell from ringing, 
Hemingway's deafness prevented him 
from hearing the bell ring, but as he 

125 



Something Else Again 

had been deaf for 20 years, he attributed 
no importance to the silence. 

As Miss Smith descended, she met 
Oliver Cromwell, the well-known lord 
protector, who had condemned Under- 
wood to death. Hearing her story and 
noting her hands, bruised and torn, he 
said in part: "Go, your lover lives. 
Curfew shall not ring this evening." 



126 



("The Ballad of the Tempest") 

TOT'S FEW WORDS 
KEEP S17 SOULS 
FROM DIRE PANIC 



Babe's Query to Parent Saves Storm* 

Flayed Ship's Passengers Crowded 

in Cabin 



FEARFUL THING IN WINTER 



BOSTON, MASS, Jan. 17— 

Cheered by the faith of little 

"Jennie" Carpenter, the 7-year- 
old daughter of Capt. B. L. Carpenter, 
of a steamer whose name could not be 
learned, 117 passengers on board were 
brought through panic early this morn- 
ing while the storm was at its height, 
to shore. 

George H. Nebich, one of the pas- 
sengers, told the following story to a 
COURIER reporter : 

"About midnight we were crowded in 
the cabin, afraid to sleep on account of 
the storm. All were praying, as Capt. 
Carpenter, staggering down the stairs, 
cried: 'We are lost!' It was then that 
little 'Jennie/ his daughter, took him 
by his hand and asked him whether he 
did not believe in divine omnipresence. 
All the passengers kissed the little 
127 



Something Else Again 

'girlie' whose faith had so inspirited 
us." 

The steamer, it was said at the office 
of the company owning her, would leave 
as usual to-night for Portland. 



128 



("Plain Language from Truthful James") 

AH SIN, TAMED TONG MAN, 
BESTS BARD AT CARD TILT 

"Celestial" Gambler, Feigning Igno- 
rance of Euchre, Tricks Francis 
Bret Harte and "Bill" Nye 
into Heavy Losses — Solons 
to Probe Ochre Peril 

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 3.— Francis 
B. Harte and E. W. Nye, a pair of local 
magazine writers, lost what is believed 
to be a large sum of money in a game 
of euchre played near the Bar-M mine 
this afternoon. 

There had been, Harte alleged, a 
three-handed game of euchre partici- 
pated in by Nye, a Chinaman named Ah 
Sin and himself. The Chinaman, Harte 
asserted, did not understand the game, 
but, Harte declared, smiled as he sat by 
the table with what Harte termed was 
a "smile that was childlike and bland." 

Harte said that his feelings were 
shocked by the chicanery of Nye, but 
that the hands held by Ah Sin were 
unusual. _ Nye, maddened by the China- 
man's trickery, rushed at him, 24 packs 
of cards spilling from the tong-man's 
long sleeves. On his taper nails was 
found some wax. 

The "Mongolian," Harte said, is pe- 
culiar. 

Harte and Nye are thought to have 
lost a vast sum of money, as they are 
wealthy authors. 

The legislature, it is said, will inves- 
tigate the question of the menace to 
American card-players by the so-called 
Yellow peril. 

129 



("Excelsior") 



DOG FINDS LAD 
DEAD IN DRIFT 



Unidentified Body of Young Traveler 

Found by Faithful Hound Near 

Small Alpine Village — White 

Mantle His Snowy Shroud 



ST. BERNARD, Sept. 12.— Early 
this morning a dog belonging to the St. 
Bernard Monastery discovered the body 
of a young man, half buried in the 
snow. 

In his hand was clutched a flag with 
the word "Excelsior" printed on it. 

It is thought that he passed through 
the village last night, bearing the ban- 
ner, and that a young woman had of- 
fered him shelter, which he refused, 
having answered "Excelsior." 

The police are working on the case. 



130 



("The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers") 

PILGRIM DADS 
LAND ON MASS. 
COAST TOWN 



Intrepid Band of Britons, Seeking 

Faith's Pure Shrine, Reach 

Rock-Bound Coast, Singing 

Amid Storm 



PROVINCETOWN, MASS, 
Dec. 21 — Poking her nose 

through the fog, the ship Mayflower, 
of Southampton, Jones, Master, limped 
into port to-night. 

On board were men with hoary hair 
and women with fearless eyes, 109 in 
all. 

Asked w r hy they had made the jour- 
ney, they alleged that religious freedom 
was the goal they sought here. 

The Mayflower carried a cargo of an- 
tique furniture. 

Among those on board were William 
Bradford, M. Standish, Jno. Alden, 
Peregrine White, John Carver and 
others. 

Steps are being taken to organize a 
society of Mayflower Descendants. 
131 



("The Bridge of Sighs") 

KINLESS YOUNG 
WOM, WEARY, 
TAKES OWN LIFE 

Body of Girl Found in River 

Tells Pitiful Story of Home- 

lessness and Lack of 

Charity 

LONDON, March 16.— The body of a 
young woman, her garments clinging 
like cerements, was found in the river 
late this afternoon. 

In the entire city she had no home. 
There are, according to the police, no 
relatives. 

The woman was young and slender 
and had auburn hair. 

No cause has been assigned for the 
act. 



*3* 



Song of Synthetic Virility 

OH, some may sing of the surging sea, or 
chant of the raging main; 
Or tell of the taffrail blown away by the rag- 
ing hurricane. 
With an oh, for the feel of the salt sea spray 

as it stipples the guffy's cheek! 
And oh, for the sob of the creaking mast and 

the halyard's aching squeak! 
And some may sing of the galley-foist, and 

some of the quadrireme, 
And some of the day the xebec came and 

hit us abaft the beam. 
Oh, some may sing of the girl in Kew that 

died for a sailor's love, 
And some may sing of the surging sea, as I 

may have observed above. 



Oh, some may long for the Open Road, or 

crave for the prairie breeze, 
And some, o'ersick of the city's strain, may 

yearn for the whispering trees. 
With an oh, for the rain to cool my face, 

and the wind to blow my hair! 
And oh, for the trail to Joyous Garde, where 

I may find my fair! 
And some may love to lie in the field in the 

stark and silent night, 
The glistering dew for a coverlet and the 

moon and stars for light. 
133 



Something Else Again 

Let others sing of the soughing pines and 
the winds that rustle and roar, 

And others long for the Open Road, as I may 
have remarked before. 



Ay, some may sing of the bursting bomb and 

the screech of a screaming shell, 
Or tell the tale of the cruel trench on the 

other side of hell. 
And some may talk of the ten-mile hike in 

the dead of a winter night, 
And others chaunt of the doughtie Kyng with 

mickle valour dight. 
And some may long for the song of a child 

and the lullaby's fairy charm, 
And others yearn for the crack of the bat 

and the wind of the pitcher's arm. 
Oh, some have longed for this and that, and 

others have craved and yearned; 
And they all may sing of whatever they like, 

as far as I'm concerned. 



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